Yesterday didn’t go so well for Gov. Jerry Brown, who has spent the past week courting a handful of GOP legislators in an attempt to get them on board with his budget - which calls on the General Assembly to refer an extension of the 2009 Schwarzenegger tax hikes to the ballot. Five of the GOP senators whose votes Gov. Brown has been seeking to buy sent a letter to Brown yesterday informing him that negotiations had reached an impasse, reflecting the fact that Brown really doesn’t have anything to offer GOP legislators in exchange for their votes.

In their letter to Brown, the five Republican senators express their disappointment that all of their proposed reforms were rebuffed:

“We were therefore disappointed to find that our reforms were either rejected or so watered down as to have no real effect on future spending or the economy. We have therefore concluded that you are unable to compel other stakeholders to accept real reform.”

Proposals offered by the GOP included a spending cap, regulatory reform, and pension reform. Not surprisingly, Brown admitted yesterday that he may now miss his self-imposed budget deadline this Thursday.

The good news for California taxpayers is that Gov. Brown still does not have the four Republican votes that he needs to put an extension of the largest state tax hike in U.S. history on the ballot. But as Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg remarked yesterday, “72 hours is a lifetime in this business.”

ATR urges California taxpayers to contact their representative in Sacramento today and urge them to hold the line against more job-killing tax increases and oppose Gov. Brown’s budget. Tell Gov. Brown to go back to the drawing board and craft a budget that brings expenditures in line with revenue by simply clicking here.

Posted by Patrick Gleason on Tuesday, March 8, 2011 10:16 AM EST

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